Into the Light
by Merlla Aoi
Summary: A sequal to Dark Shadows.
1. Chapter 1

Ch. I

When I saw her I recognized her immediately though my presence didn't even seem to register in her mind. She was not paying attention. Her Mind was focused in-wards as it had so often been during those last days. She would stare at the ground or a wall, and you could tell she was escaping.

I had heard of a mysterious girl whom the Lord Marshal kept all to himself. She never left his quarters and only a few Necromongers had caught glimpses of her when they'd had an excuse to visit the Lord Marshal at home. They found it all the more strange that she seemed not at all they type of girl he would want. She was extremely shy, passive, silent. Her name, one Necromonger told me, was Li. 


	2. Chapter 2

Ch. II

"Li."

"Yes?"

"You should turn the light on sometimes," he said, brightening the light in the room as he spoke. "It's not good for your eyes."

"I don't care about my eyes." She pulled the bedcovers up over her head. "I don't like it."

Riddick smiled.

"Well, I don't either kid," he said, leaving the room. Then, from the kitchen, "And you shouldn't sleep so much. It's--"

"Not good for me?"

"Actually, I was gonna say "It's boring" but that's true too."

"Riddick, there's something you should know. I'm a very tired, very boring person," she called from her bed.

"Come on, get up." He got a mug down from a cupboard. "There's coffee."

He looked up to see her in the door-way.

"Where?" 


	3. Chapter 3

Ch. III

"Lord Marshal, I'm sorry to interrupt, but--"

Riddick turned from the Necromonger he was talking to, to the one addressing him.

"Can't you see I'm busy?" he growled.

"Yes sir, but I need--"

"Who are you Necro?" he demanded.

"Commander Deric. My company was recalled from duty weeks ago but it took so long, I've only just arrived."

"That's very interesting Deric," he said, "but I'm in the middle of something a little more important than your life story right now. So if you'll excuse me." He turned back to the Necromonger he had been conversing with.

He took a deep breath, gathering courage to interrupt the Lord Marshal once more. "It's about Li."

The room immedietley fell silent. Riddick turned.

"What did you say?" 


	4. Chapter 4

Ch.IV

It was late and Riddick had still not returned. He usually came home before dinner and that had been hours ago. He said he didn't like spending anymore time with the Necromongers than necessary and he usually hurried home. She was getting worried.

For a brief moment she thought that perhaps he had been killed, that a Necromonger had risen against him in pursuit of power. But he was Riddick, after all. She could not picture him so easily defeated. 

It was far more likely that he had simply gone. He'd said the only reason he stayed on with the Necros was to "clean-up the mess." To end the destruction the last Lord Marshal had orchestrated. Li thought he did it because of Kira and because of the man Imam, who had been killed. But maybe Riddick had finally given-up and cleared-out leaving Li behind.

She had begun to trust him, to believe him when he said he wouldn't get tired of her. After being abandoned so many times, it had been hard to give him that trust.  
She sat down on the couch and stared at the door. Maybe he really had left her, or maybe she was just being paranoid. Either way, all she could do was wait.

"Li listen to me. I have to go away. I have to leave to make some money for us. When I have enough I'll come and get you and we'll be together. I'll take care of you"  
She looked at her brother with tears in her eyes. It was raining heavily outside in the night while she watched him pack his few belonging in a black trunk. It was like a coffin in which he was burying her nice, secure life. "Deric, no! You don't need to leave! Stay here and take care of me now. When mom gets better"  
He turned and looked at his little sister, his face forcibly strict.  
"Mom isn't getting better Li. She's going to die and she doesn't want us around when she does it." His expression softened a little. "I know it's hard, but the sooner you get used to it the better"  
"Why can't we just live together then?" she asked.  
"I don't have enough money to support the two of us. You're going to have to go live with your father while I work. I'll come and get you as soon as I possibly can." He closed the trunk and fastened it securely. 


	5. Chapter 5

Ch. V

When he arrived home he found Li asleep on the couch. The place was almost completely dark.

He sat down on the floor next to her and listened to her breathing. The expression on her face was so calm. Sleep was the only time she was completely relaxed. He wondered what he looked like when he slept.

She stirred. He touched her cheek and she opened her eyes..

"You came back."

"Of course I came back kid," he said. " I just had a busy day, that's all."

"Your dinner got cold," she said, sitting up.

"Don't worry about it. I'm not hungry, just gonna go to bed."

Lying in bed he could hear her getting ready to go to sleep in the next room. 

He thought again of how weak she was and how she instilled a sort of weakness in him. But she seemed to have grown a bit stronger during the time she'd been staying with him. She spoke more, though she occasionally reverted back to her original silence and she had even made eye-contact a few times. 

The weakness she caused in him was something he had never experienced before. He found himself behaving in a way that was strange to him, like when he touched her cheek to wake her. A simple action so tender, he had never felt the need to do something like that before. He had never understood why someone would want to. But now... Li needed him, and though he would never have thought it possible, he needed her. Dependency was something he had always despised. Jack (or Kyra), had opened the door for this, he knew. She was the first person that he would have ever considered getting close to, but even so, he had to try to keep her away for her own good. That hadn't worked-out so well. He didn't want that to happen with Li. 


	6. Chapter 6

Ch. VI

The next morning Li was sitting at the table in the kitchen when he asked,

"Li, do you have a brother?"

The book she was reading fell from her hands to the table and her eyes opened wide.

"Jeremi? Is it Jeremi!"

"No... He said his name was Deric. Who's-?"

"How do you know about Deric?" The look of fear left her face. "Is he here? Riddick, I have to see him!" She left her chair and hurried across the room to him.

"Hold on a minute," he said. "So this guy really is your brother?"

"Yeah, I haven't seen him in so long. I thought he was dead! He left right before..."

"Right before what?" he asked.

"Right before I... went to live with my father's family."

"So this guy is ok? You want to see him?"

"Yes, of course I do! Where is he?"

"Well," Riddick said, studying her, "he had some things to do. He won't be back until tomorrow. You can see him then."

"Riddick, this is so wonderful." She smiled up at him and he realized that he had never seen her so happy.

"But wait, who's Jeremi?" he asked.

Her smile faded.

"He's my half-brother. He... I hate him. I never want to see him again." She fell silent, then after a moment her smile returned, though a little less enthusiastic.

"But, it's Deric, not Jeremi. Deric."

She sat on the porch and wrapped her jacket around herself, trying in vain to keep out the chill wind that blew around her. She put her hands over her ears, trying in vain to keep out the chill words that blew through the open front door.  
"I didn't plan this Rosalind! Do you think I would have? This isn't my fault!" her father yelled at his wife inside.  
"Why is she here Jon? What are you trying to do to me? To Jeremi! That's your idiotic mistake out there! You made it and now we have to take care of it!" Li heard something crash inside.  
"Ros! Please!" he pleaded. "I'm sorry, but there isn't much I can do about it now! Do you want me to throw the kid out on the street"  
For a while the only sound was Rosalind's sobbing.  
"No, of course I don't want you to throw her out... She can stay"  
"Are you sure?" he asked.  
"She can stay. But she is your daughter, not mine! She's your responsibilty." 


	7. Chapter 7

Ch. VII

"Lord Marshal. I... wasn't expecting you. Is there--" he said, startled to find Riddick standing at his door.

"Can it kid." Without waiting for an invitation, Riddick entered, forcing Deric to step back into the room.

"I ain't here to chit-chat. I need you to tell me who you are."

"Sir, I've told you who I am," he said. "I'm Deric, Li's brother."

"Her brother?"

"Her half-brother," he corrected himself. "We have the same mother."

"She died."

"Yes, I believe so. She was sick, I haven't heard from her in over ten years." His eyes darted to the door and then back to his interregator.

"Don't think of leaving just yet," he warned. "I wanna know where you've been. If you're her big brother how come you haven't been around to keep her out of trouble?"

"Look," he took a step trying to put some space between them. "It's not my fault. Mom was sick and didn't want to be bothered with us anymore. She sent Li to live with her father. I went to work on Cirrus Five. Afterwards I was never able to locate either of them. I joined-up with the Necromongers and here I am."

"And here you are," Riddick echoed. 


	8. Chapter 8

Ch. VIII

"So this brother of yours..."

"Yeah, what about him?" she answered from the kitchen.

"When you guys meet, you're gonna get all buddy-buddy, huh?"

"What?" she asked, "What do you mean?"

"Well, I mean, you're gonna wanna go stay with him, right?"

She didn't answer.

"Li?"

"What? I couldn't hear you over the running water." Her voice sounded strange.

Riddick turned to look at her. She had stopped washing the dishes and stood staring at the sink.

"How do you know he's the same guy you remember? You were only, what? Ten when you last saw him?"

"Eleven." Her reply was barely audible.

"That's a long time. He could be a completely different person. How do you know you can trust him?" he asked.

"He's my brother. He always took care of me."

"Yeah, he sure did a good job with that. Where were you when Jack found you? Oh I remember, a slave ship." 

"Hey! That wasn't Deric's fault!" She hadn't expected him to say something so hurtful.

"Well, where was he? If he was really so great he wouldn't have left his helpless little sister to the mercy of mercs!"

Li's face darkened in rage. "That sounds familiar Riddick. Where the hell were you when Kyra needed you? She was on that same slave ship! You abandoned her too! You have no right to lecture about responsibility!" She slammed the plate she had been holding down in the sink and stormed off to her room.

"He's a Necro!" He yelled after her. "Li! Li!" He followed her but she had locked her door. He pounded on it and told her to come out. She gave no answer. 


	9. Chapter 9

Ch. IX

It was true, he was no different than Li's brother. He had left Jack when she needed him. He just wasn't thinking straight when he got into that argument with Li. Something wasn't right with Deric, but he didn't know what.  
Or maybe he was all right. Maybe he was just a guy who was happy to find the one remaining member of his family. Maybe Riddick just didn't want to lose Li to him.  
He wouldn't openly admit it, but Riddick cared for this girl. This helpless, pathetic girl. He enjoyed living with her and taking care of her. She needed him.  
Now she needed someone else.

Why had Riddick said such things about Deric? He should have been happy that she'd found her brother. And now he expected her to leave. Just when she thought she was beginning to understand the man, something always happened to thwart her confidance. Her happiness. She had started to be happy here. Deric's reappearnce should have been happy, but it was only bittersweet. For the first time since her mother had died, Li had felt as if she had a home. Now she chastized herself for allowing her guard to drop, to get used her environment and to think of it as a home. Her only home had been with her mother and Deric. 


	10. Chapter 10

Ch. X

The house was quieter than it should have been. Jon and Jeremi were out. Rosalind should have been in the garden, or cooking, or cleaning the kitchen, or something. Something seemed wrong.  
Li walked cautiously from room to room in search of her. Finally she pushed back her father and Rosalind's bedroom door and found her lying on the bed. There was no sound. No birds outside, no music playing as she usually had on days when her husband was gone. No sound or movement came from the bed. She was dead. She knew it. Was this what her mother had looked like when she had died? Silent and still? No, her mother would have gone in a torrent of coughs and wheezes. Rosalind's death was peaceful. No... deliberate.  
She found herself backing out of the room. She knocked over an end table and heard its contents crash to the floor. They would think it was her fault, that she had caused this. She had to leave before they came home. 


	11. Chapter 11

Ch. XI 

When she woke it was at that awful time between late night and early morning, when you weren't sure if you wanted to go foward or

backward only that either would be better than the nothingness of three a.m. What made it even worse was remembering her

conversation with Riddick. She shouldn't stay. She'd gotten to used to this place and to the man who owned it. She wasn't a part of it, no

matter how much she'd like to pretend otherwise. But she had nowhere else to go until she met Deric. Then she had an even more terrible

thought. What if Deric didn't want her either? What if he had come just out of obligation and didn't really want her around permanently?

He must have a life of his own now. He might even have children. She hadn't thought of that. He couldn't take care of her if he had his

own new family to take care of. It'd be just like when she had gone to live with her father. She would be a burden.

Hoping Riddick would be in bed, she left her room and went to get some water in the dark kitchen. She fumbled with the cup as she

was filling it and splashed water onto herself. Something about the water made her shudder, almost like it reminded her of a bad dream

she'd forgotten. She turned around and ran straight into someone. He grabbed her arms and she screamed.

"Relax kid, it's just me," said Riddick. "Hey, you don't look so good"

Li was gasping for air. Her knees started to buckle and Riddick picked her up. He sat her down on the couch and turned the lights up.

"You shouldn't be walking around in the dark like that. Look kid, just calm down. You're ok"

She caught her breath and drew her knees up to her chin. "I don't know what it was," she said, more to herself than to him. "Like deja

vu..." She pulled her left sleeve up and examined her scars. "You just need some sleep," he said. "Yeah..." She slowly rose to her feet and

headed to her room.

Lying in her bed again she stared at the ceiling, trying to remember whatever it was that she had caught a glimpse of in that awful split-

second. It was like a dream you forget after you wake up, only to have it all come rushing back hours later when you aren't thinking about

it. But this dream was a nightmare. She felt that something horrifying had happened to her and as much as she wanted to figure out what it

was, she was afraid that she was better off not remembering. And in spite of everything that she had told herself earlier, she wished

Riddick was with her, to protect her.

Riddick regretted startling her. Normally it was just standard operating procedure to remain in the dark where he had the advantage

and moniter everything else. But he never wanted to make her scream like that, like he'd made so many others scream out in terror. And

the way she'd reacted... It wasn't just him scaring her, it was something else. Something he couldn't detect. A hidden threat to Li. That

was something that worried him. He'd promised himself to protect the girl but if there was some strange new danger that he couldn't see,

what defense did he have against that? He would just have to do the best he could until she left to be with her brother. Stretching his legs

out across the hallway, he leaned his head against Li's door and waited for the morning.


End file.
